


ascend

by screechfox



Series: Author's Favourites [10]
Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Canon Backstory, Canon Compliant, Difficult Decisions, Implied Murder, Other, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, hey fellas is it gay to throw yourself into the welcoming embrace of the sky?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-21
Updated: 2020-01-21
Packaged: 2021-02-27 03:55:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22350700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/screechfox/pseuds/screechfox
Summary: It’s a leap of faith, in the end.(Mike Crew, Ex Altiora, and the infinite reaches of the Vast.)
Relationships: Michael "Mike" Crew/The Vast
Series: Author's Favourites [10]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1829980
Comments: 34
Kudos: 139
Collections: The Magnus Archives Rare Pairs 2020





	ascend

**Author's Note:**

  * For [firstmaterial](https://archiveofourown.org/users/firstmaterial/gifts).



> Beta-read by [skvadern](https://archiveofourown.org/users/skvadern).

It’s a leap of faith, in the end.

Well, strictly speaking, there’s no faith to Mike’s self-made incantation; no faith to the way he pleads for the attention of something far greater than himself. He screams into the uncaring void, and he doesn’t dare to hope that it'll look back and deem him worthy of saving. But he has the book, and he has his words, and most importantly, he has the three hundred foot drop to the pavement below. These things are real. He has faith in that, at least.

For a single faltering moment, he wonders if he’ll ever see his flat again. It’s not much of a home, but it has his research and his clothes and a dark-furred cat that lives two doors down and visits him sometimes. There are scratches on an awful lot of antique books because of that cat, but for some reason he could never bear to throw it out into the corridor.

All the same, Mike knows that he can’t turn back now. If he dies, he dies. If he lives… anything could happen.

One way or another, this is the end. He refuses to be scared anymore.

Lightning arcs around the room with furious intent, never touching his skin. He doesn’t know if his tormentor wants to kill him or claim him; is there even a difference, at this point?

Clutching Ex Altiora with white-knuckled fingers, he forces himself to focus on the words pouring from his mouth. His voice is raw with desperation as he recites every invocation he could find for this endless dizzying power, every name that seems worth calling out to. 

“I am yours,” Mike shouts, pleads, _prays,_ throwing his head to the sky. 

Then he jumps, and the world vanishes beneath him.

If his call has gone unanswered, there are roughly four seconds before he breaks every bone in his body. Mike stares up into the swirling tempest above and laughs, breathless and triumphant. He wins.

In the moment before he should impact the ground, the tether tying him to reality goes taut. There’s an echo of pain shuddering across his back, stars bursting in his eyes— then, with the blessed relief of a storm cutting through hot summer air, the tether snaps, and Mike falls.

Rushing air embraces him, cradles him in sharp vertigo. Windburn caresses his cheeks, and the simplicity of the gentle ache is soothing. His scar doesn’t hurt, but it’s alive with energy all the same, electric with the blinding-bright power of the sky itself. Mike always thought it was a curse, but now he knows better: the Vast has seared itself into his very soul.

(Somewhere far above, a creature of lightning and ozone and shifted perceptions screams as it is trapped in the heights it was never meant to touch. It struggles, but there's nothing to find purchase on, only clouds and wind and falling, forever.)

Ex Altiora tumbles from Mike’s fingers, and he lets it go. He doesn’t need it anymore; the Vast has answered his call and forced its way into his very being. It steals his breath and hollows his bones, filling him with an infinite nothingness as terrifying as it is exhilarating. It’s endless and incomprehensible, the most beautiful feeling he could never have imagined. 

Terminal velocity is well-named: Mike feels like he’ll die if he ever has to touch the ground again.

All around him, the clouds are parting. He squints against the shapeless blue, then thinks better of it, opening his eyes wide and taking in as much as he can. His mind isn’t enough to contain it all; the sky only gets wider and wider with every second that passes. His thoughts rebel at the impossibility of witnessing the incomprehensible. On a cosmic scale, he is utterly insignificant, but the cosmos is pouring into his lungs and he can taste starlight.

It isn’t freedom— except it is: the joy of the fall can carry him anywhere worth going, and what is that if not freedom? The Vast is pushing at his limits and he welcomes it, because everything it does takes him further from the scared little boy tracing his scar underneath the covers.

The seconds stretch into eternity as he plummets through stars and empty darkness, clouds and clear blue sky. The universe swallows him whole, fills every part of him with the terror of its endless reaches. It’s an awful gift, lifting him out of insignificance for a few wonderful moments — then letting him fall back to the hard ground below with a crack like breaking bones, like thunder.

As Mike stares up at the sky, so far out of reach, he distantly wonders if he’s been abandoned. After all, the universe doesn’t care; compared to the intricate dance of galaxies, he is nothing. He can’t tell if he’s laughing or crying, but the tears on his cheeks are warm and beautiful.

A gentle breeze of displaced air marks someone’s approach. Out of the corner of his eye, Mike can see heavy boots, muddy jeans — a figure who has spent their life firmly on the ground. Pity.

“Are you alright, mate?”

It’s hard to remember how to fight against gravity and make himself move, but he manages to turn his head and look them in the eye. A concerned expression on a warm round face that has clearly never wanted for anything — not freedom, not adventure, not flight. Mike blinks slowly at them, feeling the abyss underneath his ribs grow ever-wider, ever-hungrier.

“Shit,” they mutter, taking his non-response as a negative. “How did you even get out here?”

“I fell,” Mike manages, tasting blood on his tongue as he speaks. It’ll take more than a cup of tea to soothe his throat after what he’s put it through tonight.

The stranger startles. Uneasiness crosses their face as they glance up at the empty sky. Somehow, he knows that they’re imagining that fall, terror gripping their heart at the thought of it. It fades slowly, their expression turning stoic and purposeful.

“Can you sit up?”

Their hands are warm and calloused and grounded as they help him upright. Mike sighs, wistful in a way he can’t name. He feels like his legs are swinging over a cliff’s-edge precipice, and it would be natural as breathing to push himself into the arms of gravity all over again.

Maybe it should feel strange to stare at this stranger, to watch them sway with sudden lurching vertigo. Instead, it’s exhilarating, his stomach swooping like he’s tipped over the peak of a rollercoaster, caught up in the delight of freefall. It’s a lie to say he doesn’t know what he’s doing when he clasps their hand and pulls them over the edge. His would-be saviour screams as the sky claims them both, and all he feels is a singular shining joy at how easy it is to fall.

If this is how he stays free, he’s more than willing to drag other people to the altar of the skies. It’s communion and sacrifice all at once, and most importantly, it’s life, purer than anyone else will ever walk away from. That, more than anything, is what the Vast has given him. 


End file.
